The last night in the apartment, Dez, Wren (back for five days with suitcase and sun on her cheeks), and Gus stood before the tree, which they had kept up past Epiphany out of sheer stubborn theology. Needles carpeted the floor like a final argument. Dez unplugged the lights. The room dimmed into ordinary purple.
"End of an era," Gus said.
"Beginning of a run-on sentence," Wren said.
Dez wrapped the angel in tissue and nested her in the KEEP box. "She comes with me," he said. "Everywhere."
They carried the tree down the stairs together—carefully, knees engaged, lessons learned—and left it on the curb for pickup, a giant that had done its work. A passing kid touched a branch and looked up at them as if they had set down a myth. Maybe they had.
At JFK, Dez kissed Wren hard enough to remember through a cross-country call. "Call when you land."
"Call when you decide about Portland."